Hello. I'm trying to use Mathematica to return only the first few digits of a number, but I have been encountering a problem using the N[] function. You see, it seems that N[] tries to calculate the entire number before returning the requested approximation. I, however, would prefer that it not do that, because the calculation involved would take far too much processor time for the function's execution to be practical.

Essentially, I want Mathematica to calculate just one digit of the number, then return that one digit, or calculate just two digits of the number, then return those digits.